The crude, extremely biased article gives no indication that it’s written by the UK government. The closest it comes to doing so is right at the end, where it says “Get the facts at www.gov.uk/scottishreferendum“. The Buzzfeed account page makes no reference to the UK government, and the layout makes the piece look like any normal article on the site, although in fact it’s posted on Buzzfeed Community, which is an area where users can post anything they want to without censorship.

We decided to find out more.

The first clue to the government’s direct involvement was that the author page sent readers to @YouDecide2014, a Twitter account which has a link to the Scotland Office home page, but otherwise presents itself as a source of neutral information, saying only “The Scottish Referendum on 18th September 2014 is a massive decision that needs proper thought. You Decide is here to give you the facts ahead of the vote”.

It gives its location as “Edinburgh”, and offers no indications that it’s in any way connected to the UK Government or is on one side of the debate. As the story developed on Twitter, an alert reader noticed something strange:

You can’t get a verified Twitter account except by arrangement with Twitter.

Therefore, @YouDecide2014 must be an official account of the Scotland Office. That certainly explains why Tory special advisors were tweeting the Buzzfeed article.

Curious, we visited the Scotland Office website. The most recent press release is headlined “Scottish Independence Referendum: myths must be debunked”, and links straight to the BuzzFeed page.

So it’s official: the UK government has attacked the Scottish government on Buzzfeed. Is this a first in international (albeit intrastate) relations? Will it set a precedent? Will the next Ukraine crisis negotiations be carried out in the medium of ironic animated GIFs or viral video?

The absence of any clear statements of the UK government’s involvement looks like an attempt to mislead the public. But there are even more serious issues.

Presumably, someone at the Scotland Office wrote the article, as it’s been released through official Government channels. They couldn’t be an ordinary civil servant, who would be bound to impartiality – and if there’s one thing that’s had Unionist politicians and media in a froth of outrage throughout the independence campaign it’s the thought of civil servants being made to act in an improperly political manner.

So this kind of work would have to be carried out by a special adviser. Could it have been one of the special advisers who tweeted the article? Surely not, as that would breach their code of conduct:

All the buzzfeed vote no sucker Scotland links are to official UK.gov propaganda online which was all very weird, and then you read this. Another wizard wheeze from the chaps/chapesses in Whitehall and all with their “we” collective, for extra truthiness.

Fact: Labour, Conservatives and Lib Dems have all made clear if we leave the UK we’ll also leave the UK pound. A currency union would not work for Scotland or the rest of the UK – it will not happen.
Sources: Scotland analysis: currency and monetary policy, April 2013, Scotland analysis: assessment of a sterling currency union, February 2014

I’m still waiting for any sort of response from the Scotland Office to the claim that Scotland will be unable to keep the pound.

I have asked if this claim refers to keeping the £ in a currency union or if it means under any circumstances. As they know the latter is a lie, they can’t legally stop any country using the £ if they want to and they know it.

I have yet to receive an answer. Anyone shocked that the Scotland Office is promoting blatant lies? Not me any more.

Danny Alexander cost Scotland £5Billion+ a year. In 2011 Budget Scottish Grant £1.Billion a year and increased Oil tax 11% (£2Billion) a year to 80%, while supporting multinationals tax evading in the City of London. Danny Aexander has no economic experience. The Royal Mail sell off made £millions for Osbourne’s best man and brother in law.

There’s going to be more and more of this sort of stuff as the referendum draws closer. No Borders is dodgy as hell, as is their “Flowers of Union” band, which is actually a private limited company set up last year by Fiona Gilmore.

I saw a link on this to the British military. That’s a bit scary if unsurprising. Glad to see mention of Danny Alexander ‘monstering’ business leaders. It’s the first mention I’ve seen of his game-changing speech yesterday or whenever. I’m missing Flipper badly these days but it seems he was in the Western Isles, possibly exchanging ideas with a former UK government high-flier on how to keep the nose in the trough after collapse of Westminster career. As for Lamont, maybe calling out the numbers at bingo somewhere.

I think our side of the Referendum debate (YES),should be a bit more proactive in these shady U.K. Govt /MSM practices.
surely we cannot be treated as a punch-bag until September….are we not allowed to fight back at all in the terms of the Edinburgh Agreement?.
6 million human beings were destroyed in WW11,by turning the other cheek.

So for this kind of Gov.uk “fact” about Scottish government Fact: “The Scottish Government assumes that oil and gas can be produced at zero costs (so rigs and pipelines can be built and run for free, and oil workers don’t need to be paid),” they link that gibberish up to

FLOWERS OF UNION LTD
Fiona Gilmore has been employed at FLOWERS OF UNION LTD since 19 December 2013 currently as a Director.
active
Company address: FLOWERS OF UNION LTD
32-34 GREAT MARLBOROUGH ST, GREAT MARLBOROUGH STREET, LONDON, UNITED KINGDOM, W1F 7JB
NO BORDERS CAMPAIGN
Fiona Gilmore has been employed at NO BORDERS CAMPAIGN since 18 March 2014 currently as a Director (DIRECTOR/COMMUNICATIONS ADVISER).
active
Company address: NO BORDERS CAMPAIGN
24 CHISWELL STREET, LONDON, UNITED KINGDOM, EC2Y 4YX

The secret intelligence services? They ain’t very secret nor are they very intelligent, However they have all the resources of the state at their back to protect them. Mmm that’s a good point who or what is it they are protecting?

The corrupt rotten system (establishment) from the population they monster and control in whichever way is required to keep the peasants on message and compliant while the establishment pillage and plunder and line their pockets at our expense.

Jack, you’re right -the time of George Orwell’s Newspeak has well and truly arrived at Westminster, the economic market rules all in the UK, and morality along with democratic control by the people is confined to the dustbin of history.

It has been written of Newspeak: “As we have already seen in the case of the word free, words which had once borne a heretical meaning were sometimes retained for the sake of convenience, but only with the undesirable meanings purged out of them. Countless other words such as honour, justice, morality, internationalism, and democracy had simply ceased to exist. A few blanket words covered them, and, in covering them, abolished them. All words grouping themselves round the concepts of liberty and equality, for instance, were contained in the single word crimethink, while all words grouping themselves round the concepts of objectivity and rationalism were contained in the single word oldthink.”

@ Bill Fraser, thanks for the link and its hard to argue with an honest fasttracked civil servant but holy shit what a bunch of berks.

“I worked for the Constitutional Policy team at Scotland Office, predominantly on the Scottish independence referendum.

The referendum is a hugely important vote and it is a completely different situation to a general election. Before a general election, civil servants prepare for all possible outcomes, however for the referendum, the UK Government has a clear policy to keep the United Kingdom together and as a UK Government civil servant, I worked to support that Government policy.

I’m sorry to be O/T. Johann Lamont doing her best to destroy the FM’s reputation now at FMQ’s. I’m sure this will rebound on her and the other political dwarfs who pass for unionist leaders at Holyrood.This is truly desperate stuff.

PS You may find it hard to believe but I am a “don’t know” at present and come to this site for insights into the debate. However, I believe all of the myth-busting facts are correct as I am not, by definition, a Scottish Nationalist – I want what’s best for the country.

O/t Full frontal attack by Opposition Parties on Alex Salmond at FM Questions! He will be fine though! He’s head and shoulders above them all! I hope people in Scotland listen to this as the Opposition parties speak with one voice! Who would have even thought that Labour, Tory and lib Dem are now one Bitter together Party! I can’t understand Labour Folk putting up with this terrible state of affairs! Keir Hardie will be rolling about in his grave!

The title of that civil servant’s post ‘Saving the Union’, shows clear impartiality, yes. The civil servant’s role should be to collect data and produce impartial reports for politicians, not embark on a political crusade to ‘save the Union’. Thin ice.

Think that’s the toughest FMQs ive come across and caught something from the BBC commentator that a paper/letter from the Ukranians cited by Salmond as support, has mysteriously been rescinded. Could be more shenanigans but don’t know if I caught it right.

For those not familiar with 1984, the removal of words from the vocabulary, was intended to make the conceptualization of particular thoughts and idea, impossible. Once that had been achieved, humanity would be held in perpetual slavery.

Can’t help thinking back to the BT facebook donation/raffle/gaming license thing a while back, and this is similar.

On it’s own and all things being equal it would be a storm in a teacup (almost a case of ‘is that all you’ve got to criticise us with’) and who gives a stuff?

But the fact is, if the YES side were to get caught out doing something remotely questionable (think Elliot Bulmers £100) then the BBC and every other outlet would be all over it for days screaming dirty tricks.

Strictly speaking, there’s nothing to stop civil servants doing Westminster’s bidding. This is a constitutional referendum, not a party political election, so Westminster can do whatever they want and still remain within the letter of the law, if not the spirit of it.

@ handclapping, its not shock, its ridiculous Gov.uk subterfugeeness. And its incredibly patronisingly dumb, like explaining the Telly Tubbies to toddlers by directing them here http://www.henryakissinger.com/

Newsnet said they forwarded a copy of a letter from a UK Ukranian organisation which denounced George Robertsons speech on admitting Russia to NATO to the BBC, so has the BBC or someone now had the Ukranians retract it I wonder.

It gives its location as “Edinburgh”, and offers no indications that it’s in any way connected to the UK Government

I’m sure I read somewhere that the Scottish Office, I think, was planning to set up an office in Edinburgh so that it could counter all those *ahem* nasty claims that were going to be coming from those nasty Nats about how evil staying in the union was. I can’t find any links at the moment but I’m sure I had seen an advert at the time for personnel to *ahem* man the phones so to speak.

—
To make sure you’re in the know, and to find the sources of these facts, join the debate at:http://www.gov.uk/scottishreferendum,
@YouDecide2014,
Facebook.com/youdecide2014,
LinkedIn.com/Scottish Referendum – You Decide
March 2014

Worth watching FMQs and the glum faces on the Labour benches when Alex Salmond pointed out that none of the opposition leaders had said a word condemning Putin or Russia before to-day.

Trust our impartial broadcasters and newspapers will give the same level of coverage to the revelations of Better Together’s main donor, and friend of Brian Wilson, Ian Taylor’s links to a banned Russian company or the UK Government’s secret attempts to persuade Putin to oppose Scottish independence as they did to Salmond’s misreported comments on Putin (a typical Alistair Campbell press release)

They know damn fine that AS is sitting, nursing his wrath, until the time that the Yes campaign wheel him out in the last weeks of the Referendum campaign.

They know that, if left unfettered, he will jack up the Yes vote by XYZ % and they are bricking that.

So, what to do?

Smear and dehumanise him; make him an ogre and a liar.

Desperate stuff.

AS knows this and it is why he is sitting back not allowing himself to be the focus of the debate rather than the argument for independence.

From time to time he opens up and blows them out of the water to remind them what awaits them.

I am a wee bit older than , naw I am like all the buggers on the march and in the Counting House, although I was only there in tissue, so here is an old Coleman Balls (Private Eye ref before it became Establishment)

Well we knew as soon as their fear bombing didn’t work, they would resort to dirty tricks and there will be worse to come.

We have to ‘Keep calm and carry on’, with sites like WoS leading the way.

Just read a shit article by Catherine MacLeod in the herald re AS and the EU fishing rights – she is an ex aide to Darling – the headline was about ‘fishy Salmond’ – that’s the sort of crap that naysayers post when they think they are being both funny and insulting when in fact they are just being thick.

My 1st comment ‘disappeared’ and then when I posted a 2nd one commenting on it’s removal, it reappeared??

I may have been politically naïve and unaware at the start of this referendum debate, I never imagined for a second the UK government would stoop so low or be so devious, even if all of the scare stories were partially true how can anyone trust or wish to be part of a union that expends so much energy to demean Scotland and deliberately lie in order to derail the democratic rights of our citizens. It’s scary, what lengths will they actually go? We just have to get out of from this damnable union

never imagined for a second the UK government would stoop so low or be so devious, even if all of the scare stories were partially true how can anyone trust or wish to be part of a union that expends so much energy to demean Scotland and deliberately lie in order to derail the democratic rights of our citizens.

O/t if I heard correctly, the Electoral Commision has ‘ enabled ‘ the CBI to de/ un register . “An honest mistake ” apparently, which throws up a couple of questions.
1. If it is an ‘ honest mistake’ why did the CBI herald it’s registration ? I think the word mandate was used in some reporting.

2. Will the EC print their legal advice they received , as this is a precedent?

3.Has this undermined the publics confidence in the EC?

Interesting that according to the EC blurb, ( a participant ) ” must make a Declaration to the EC that they wish to be a permitted participant” and “identify the outcome they will campaign for” .

As far as I can see the CBI did both , getting what they wanted so why is the EC allowing them to unregister?

O/T – The Electoral Commission are still considering the CBI application to de-register and the CBI still have the biased web Independence factsheets and the biased blog from the Director General, John Cridland, on their website.

So if you would like to ask the Commission to retain the CBI as a registered No supporter then here is the link…

I put my complaint about the CBI trying to de-register in a couple of days ago. The fact that they still have these articles on their website means they have no intention of changing their pro-union stance.

Bugger (the Panda) says:
1 May, 2014 at 11:46 am
Black Ops R Us
Spot on.
Stu, I think after Independence there will need to be a book written so that history will record all of the lies and manipulation used against the will of the Scottish People. As you will by then have a amassed a huge data base of this, I nominate you. 🙂

Well, survived the first 24 hours not posting on the Herald, and a good few more. I think a change started to come over the Herald about 2 weeks ago with an article from Catherine MacLeod, ex-advisor to Alistair Darling. A really one-sided article I (first post in) demolished in two small paragraphs. There were another couple of articles that seemed to have the same style.

Well, another article today by her “Something fishy about Salmond and the EU”, and clicking the name shows she is now a columnist, she used to be a political editor at the Herald.

So I think there will be less of the reasonable articles in the Herald, ones actually to the advantage of Independence. Alistair Darling has sent in his “big gun”.

As the Scottish Office IS the Westminster government and impartial Civil Servants, then this is a series breach of trust if it is correct.
This certainly needs looked into as a matter of importance as it appears to be there is something very strange going on. This twitter feed is not impartial, neither are Westminster politicians or former politicians.

Lots of comments that this astroturfing attempt is crude and transparent, and how strange that they can appear so, well, stupid.

I don’t think it’s that strange: BT are simply trying to corner (to put it un-politically-correctly) the hard-of-thinking market. So it doesn’t matter how made up or self contradictory or ludicrous the claims are, as long as they sound vaguely like something you should be outraged about, a large number of people will pick it up and run with it. The same people who buy the Daily Mail and so on.
There’s no fear of being ridiculed by the media, so, so why not?

I know I’m going to get told off for that but if you assume that is their (cynical) strategy, a lot of the more bonkers stuff makes sense.

Slightly O/T but regarding the attitude of the British Government establishment – I joined my local branch of the SNP in Edinburgh away back in the 1970’s and I clearly remember that one gentleman who used to attend regularly and had been in the Army (I think an officer, but memory fading after 40 years) warned us that the then British Government had contingency plans already in place for military action in case of a ‘takeover by the nationalists’. The ‘ScotNats’ were riding high at the time, of course, and oil was just coming on stream then. I’m sure he said that the HQ would be Edinburgh Castle, but can’t be firm on that. Democracy indeed. But you can’t help wondering just what military action they planned.

@Andrew Morton 1.43pm.
Thanks Andrew, I couldn’t remember, and anyway I know nothing about cricket. That’s just one of the reasons why I’ll never appear on Eggheads. They always have a cricket question.

OMG – about CBI’s ‘honest mistake’ – that means the BBC doesn’t need to resign from them now.

I would email the EC about this but need more information first, I hope BfS get on the case.

As for the Herald, I think that will be my last post for a while as they are going the way of the Guardian.

On Bella, Mike Small states:

‘You do realise that the majority of comment within both the Herald and Scotsman articles are from internal sources?
They fill their own comment space not with as you put it “zealous proponents” but with internal staff “agitators” taking both sides of the argument.
I thought that was obvious for some time now.’

I would like the Electoral Commission to retain CBI Scotland as a registered campaigner, because despite the CBI’s recent statements that the registration was conducted by an office junior, shortly after registration the head of CBI was hailing the organisation’s decision to campaign officially as a bold democratic move. The CBI’s comments to the press of the importance of their participation in the Vote No campaign does not tally with their new statements that it was a mistake. Their claim that registration was a mistake has been made given the withdrawal of around 20 Scottish businesses from the CBI and is an attempt to backtrack. I am sure that the Commission will see through this tactic.

Never thought for a minute that this would be easy, this is a revolution, a bloodless one we hope but a revolution in the eyes of Westminster. How dare the uppity Jocks do this, they have even got their own people believing it too. Look at the places they have been kicked out of and look how hard they fought.

Cameron B , I honestly hoped the EC would have some integrity but I m coming to the conclusion – you’re right. Looking at the promise the EC made ‘ gold standard’ , ‘ made in Scotland’ etc, it just appears tainted to me.

Of course , the biggest joke would be if the Electoral Commision was actually a member of the CBI…

A new grassroots pro-Union group called No Borders launches later to make what it says is an “emotional” appeal to voters.

Its spokesman, Malcolm Offord, is an investment banker originally from Greenock who now works in London and Scotland. He said the group’s aim was to engage with voters’ emotions and promote “ordinary voices”.

Mr Offord told the BBC: “It is going to allow people to tell their stories. These are not polished political voices but they are from local communities within Scotland and they are going to give the reasons why they want to keep the Union.”

The No Borders campaign is hoping to raise £400,000 through individual donations and crowd funding and it plans to spend almost all of that before the official referendum period begins on 30 May.

Greannach , sorry to go on about this but I am so angry about this decision. Not only did they ” hail the decision to campaign” as you put it, they defended it day after day as Universities and other bodies were leaving. This stinks , let’s hope Tom Gordon stops playing candy crush for 10 minutes and actually does some political reporting. He could start by asking, who gave the legal advice re the CBI and will the EC come on TV and defend their decision.

Will this decision be discussed on Scotland Tonight given the implications it has on ‘trust’ from the public?

Yes, indeed, please do as he / she suggests and visit the site, leave your comments, engage in discussions and have a laugh. And remember always call independence Separation and spell it with a capital S to make it look really scary.

I’ve expressed the same many times. I know the union has to be preserved by the BT camp, but not at the expense of the voters, who have to decide.

The last few days attacks on the FM, when previous big statements on Russia and the Ukraine by people like David Cameron, George Robertson etc were quietly squirreled away/ignored by the MSM is utterly deplorable.

Just read the EC press release which states that only certain office holders etc can legally sign the registration. But surely the intent of the organisation was to be registered regardless of who actually signed the form. Therefore, I would have thought the CBI should correctly sign the forms and resubmit as they have not withdrawn their intent of campaigning against Indy.

Sorry I’m not O/T here but think it might be relevant, well sort of. 😉

As a number of us can attest to, last night turned into a real alternative universe moment as those of us who had watched newsnicht were astounded nay blown away even by the appearance on the programme of a certain couple of websites during their *ahem* papers bit at the end. 😛

Now far be it for me to suggest that this was just a one off, which quite hopefully it isn’t. 😉 However, just to ensure we get the right message across perhaps for the next week Stu it might be interesting if the top article on Wings from say 9pm was one that, shall we say, raised questions about BBC, CBI, Electoral Commission, No Borders, Better Together etc.

I’m sure any viewer who saw a picture on Newsnicht of Wings with a rather, how shall I say, interesting headline, might be pushed over the edge to come along and *ahem* visit. I don’t think this would do the site ratings any harm either. 🙂

Now that, thanks to NNS legalities on the issue of papers and websites, we appear to be in a place with Newsnicht I don’t think any of us really dreamed could ever happen perhaps now is the time to *ahem* play them at their own game. As this is the one opportunity a night we might have from now on to get a free advert for the site why don’t we use it to OUR advantage. After all the press have been doing exactly that themselves for long enough.

HandandShrimp
Yes, the word vote has been added by the unionists. I sent No Borders a link to the VNB About Us page and now I can’t get NB to stop sending me updates every time some posts on VNB. I’m posting on VNB. The mind boggles. 🙂

Good point Alan Mcintosh if it is the CBI, who have submitted the papers incorrectly , then that’s their issue , resubmit as you say or is it the Electoral Commission who are at fault, should they have checked?

Taking this a little further or coming from a different angle, now that the BBC is actively reviewing websites during the papers review, how long before this new ‘grassroots’ ‘vote no borders’ website is reviewed?

I filled in the address form to sent a complaint to the E. Commission, wrote everything into comments.
It would not let me post, it comes up with a red box around my second name saying ” Field required” , but the field WAS filled in. I double checked and had done everything right.
Even reprinted my name in case something had stuck, but nope just the same.

Same. I’m post-moderated which means my posts go straight up (unless they cancel that!), so I’ll maybe just put in the odd one after a while. I’ve been getting stale anyway, can’t be bothered digging up the same .gov.uk url to refute some ridiculous unionist claim any more, so good idea to take a break.

CBI is an interesting one. Labour have been quite quiet and no wonder, as the CBO have campaigned against them, err, sorry, haven’t campaigned against Labour, no of course not, just been impartially dead against them and praising up the Tories.

It will have left an impression with staunch Labour activists, and hopefully more of them will come over to YES

If you keep getting updates from VNB just mark their posts as spam. The more people who mark their posts as spam the more they will have difficulty sending out messages because – no idea how this works – servers will identify their mail as spam. Anyway, sign up and then when you get an update from them mark it as spam. This is how a real grassroots campaign works.

Oh I pay attention, have for 16 months. Posts get modded our for various reasons, one including legal liability. I’ve seen a few taken out for that reason, as also for direct attacks on the author.

I’ve had a few modded out which, from memory, seemed to be OK, but there are also problems with disqus, I think it has two “logged in” cookies, but one expires after a bit of inactivity. You seem to be logged in, but the posting is lost – or disappears after appearing. A fault. They also sometimes “clean up” threads, just taking out some deadwood or semi-abusive stuff. Ah well, anyway.

What I really don’t like is totally changing the headline and the sense of the article, but leaving comments on as though they were about the article as it appears, rather than the original. That’s just sheer dishonesty and lack of integrity.

CameronB
Believe it or not, I’m related to Brodie’s. Not directly I hasten to add (at least I don’t thinks so). My Dad’s family are from Dundee.
A cousin in Dundee married a Mary Brodie and my great great grandmother’s second husband was a David Brodie 🙂

“In his speech to business leaders Mr Alexander claimed there was “more evidence for the Loch Ness monster” than facts to support the SNP’s economic case for independence.”

What has happened since the admissions by the Unionist politicians that an independent Scotland would be economically viable? What about the statement by Alexander’s boss, David Cameron, with reference to Finland, Switzerland and Norway, that “it would be wrong to suggest that Scotland could not be another such successful, independent country” (The Telegraph, 11th Septemebr 2007).

Reading between the lines, the CE do not accept that CBI are in any way neutral. The fact that their leadership are on record saying they are pro-union still stands. All that has happened is that they are now well on the radar of the CE and will have their spending checked.

As to how the “mistake” that allowed them to withdraw on a technicality goes I’d treat that with a pinch of salt. Not that it’s not true but that a sufficiently devious planner might have done it deliberately. As the CE, and perhaps CBI, is a public body it might be an interesting exercise to put in a FoI to see exactly who signed those forms.

I received an email today at work from Matthew Harvey at the Scotland office with a link to this article. To my knowledge he has not ever emailed me before. Not sure why the Scotland office have emailed me for the first time at work, out of the blue as it were. He also asked if I could forward to friends & colleagues?

O/T I’ve been toying with the idea of stopping the tv licence mandate for a while now due to ongoing bbc shambles. Any tips other than just cancelling the direct debit – I suspect the wife and wean won’t be too impressed at the thought of losing the cable channels and ensuing legal process.

“I sent a complaint and it is obvious you did not take the time to read same before sending me a generic response which did not refer to my actual complaint This response quoted Reference Case Number CAS-2687433-JR5876 This appears to be an incorrect reference as your system does not recognize same. My original complaint was in regard to your bias in favour of Pro Union parties in the Scottish referendum. I particularly referred to the OTT promotion of the No Borders Pro Union website and not the CNB fiasco. It would appear that your systems do not work and you are completely incompetent or lazy or both You are not in any way impartial and I repeat again that I wish a refund on my TV Licence as I have no wish to go on paying to be lied to”

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